"I, Doris Duke . . . do hereby make, publish and declare this to be my Last Will and Testament . . . ."
When Doris Duke died last October, the reclusive tobacco heiress and Newport summer colonist left behind a fortune - and controversy - of Donald Trump proportions.The estate of the "richest girl in the world," as Duke was once known, is worth an estimated $1.2 billion.
Her fortune includes five magnificent homes, several valuable art collections and two trusts created for Duke by her magnate father, James Buchanan Duke, for whom Duke University is named.
Throughout her life, the heiress shunned publicity.
But even in death, she has not been able to escape the spotlight.
Duke's 37-page will has become the focus of a nasty legal battle between her adopted daughter, Chandi Duke Heffner, whom she disinherited, and Duke's butler, Bernard Lafferty, whom she left in control of her fortune.
The battle is being fought in two legal arenas: New York City's Surrogate Court, where Heffner filed an objection to Duke's will, and in New Jersey's Somerset County Superior Court, where Heffner has filed a lawsuit against Duke's estate - and Lafferty - for breach of contract.
Under Duke's will, Heffner, 40, whom Duke adopted in 1988, gets nothing. In fact, in language that is cutting and clear, Duke disinherits Heffner not once, but twice, and accuses her adopted daughter of money-grubbing.
"I am confident that my father, who created certain trusts for my lifetime benefit, would not want Chandi Heffner to have any interest in such trusts, even if I had wanted her to have such an interest (which I do not)," Duke wrote on Page 16 of the will.
On Page 36, Duke laments the unusual adoption, which took place when Duke was 75 and Heffner was 35.
Frail and ailing, Duke signed the will on April 5, 1993, at her Beverly Hills home. She was 80.
In court documents, Heffner says Duke's will was not properly witnessed and that when the heiress signed it, she was lacking "sound mind and memory, did not know the extent of her property and estates" and did not understand what she was signing.